Subject:
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Re: Target market
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.lego.direct
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Date:
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Sat, 10 Feb 2001 20:03:31 GMT
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Viewed:
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459 times
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In lugnet.lego.direct, Todd Lehman writes:
> Richard was making a point about the secondary market and bulk offerings.
> That's basically AFOL territory that TLC is currently not capitalizing on.
> It's impossible to know how much money is being lost, but I'd speculate that
> it's far less than how much is being lost by not capitalizing on ways to sell
> bulk to kids.
The AFOL market is for sets and for bulk parts. Sets are currently available in
multiple venues. I don't see that changing soon. LD is taking small steps into
the bulk parts market. I'm still curious to see how far they will take that.
"Every part that TLC has ever made in every available color" ? I think not. The
amount of mold-swapping and ABS changing in manufacturing would be impressive to
achieve that. So they will look for that 20% (of everything) that will satisfy
90% of the customer's needs. This will probably mean plates, bricks, slopes amd
a few specials. I also expect these parts to be bulk packed (25's 50's etc).
None of this '1 of this part and 3 of that part' type of buying.
LDs movement into the bulk parts market may have an unintentional side-effect.
If they are successful in reaching the mass market (currently served by
Brickbay, eBay, et al), then they may cause some harm to their retailers who are
currently (unbeknownst to the retailers) selling clearance as 'raw materials' to
the sellers in the above mentioned venues. The stuff would probably sell anyway,
but not near as quickly.
<snip>
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> From statements like those (and there are other examples), I think it's
> perfectly reasonable to conclude that AFOLs are indeed part of TLC's market.
> But just *how big* a part? How important relative to kids? I don't think
> TLC has ever really said definitively (as in straight from the horse's mouth,
> in a press release or annual report, for example), but I think we can still
> draw conclusions. The conclusion I draw from all available evidence is that
> TLC still markets primarily to children but wants to very gradually expand
> that to include teens and adults.
I try to remember 'AFOLs' are not necessarily lugnet members. Lugnet members are
not necessarily adults. Not everyone who lurks in lugnet is countable. The ratio
of AFOLs might be higher/lower than what is represented in lugnet.
> What we need here is a year-by-year pie chart showing the percentages of
> product going to various age ranges. Only LEGO knows that info and I doubt
> they'd share it (for competitive reasons), but I'll bet you that the segments
> containing age ranges 20+ are on the rise -- gradually -- over the past 10
> years.
I wonder if TLC has this info (and how large the error margins are). I believe
that they have some feel for it, but the final numbers almost have to be
statistically derived. I know of one K-Mart that (the register) always asks for
my birthdate when I buy Lego there. The checkout clerk looks at it like "huh ?",
then usually types in '1/1/01' without even asking me. So much for gathering
data at the point of sale. This was amusing two years ago ("99 year olds buying
Lego ??")
> And that's good.
Yep, I'm all for an expanding market. Times are tough, they look to be a bit
tougher. The worst that could happen is for TLC to go under. They need us, and
we need them, hopefully in a cooperative manner.
Ray
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Target market
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| (...) John, I snipped a lot of stuff, including where you talked about an AFOL:KABOB ratio, so I get what you're saying, but I want to focus on the above. Richard was making a point about the secondary market and bulk offerings. That's basically (...) (23 years ago, 10-Feb-01, to lugnet.lego.direct)
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